Captain Lindsey's Shanty World

Songs, Ports & Passages, Ships, Reference

AWAY RIO

(Rio Grande or Bound for the Rio Grande)

According to William Doerflinger, in Songs of the Sailor and Lumberman, "This shanty," said Captain Patrick Tayluer, "was generally sung aboard of those little Baltimore vessels that used to run down to São Paulo and back to the United States with coffee - to São Paulo and the Rio Grande and Brazils. It was a beautiful place, and the sailors used to love it - and the song was sung by seamen all over the world."

"Rio Grande," in Brazil, carried on a busy trade with the United States and Britain, The "river," is the mouth of the passage connecting the Lagoa dos Patos with the open sea.

I'll sing you a song, a good song of the sea,
Away, Rio.
I'll sing you a song if you'll sing it with me,
And we're bound for the Rio Grande.

Away, Rio, away, Rio!
It's fair ye well my pretty young girls,
And we're bound for the Rio Grande!

We'll man up the capstan and run her around,
We'll haul up the anchor to this jolly old sound.

Heave with a will boys oh heave long and strong,
Sing a good chorus for 'tis a good song.

The chain's up and down now the bos'n did say,
Heave up to the hawsepipe the anchor's aweigh.

The anchor's aweigh and the sails are all set,
The gals we are leaving we'll never forget.

It's goodbye to Sally and goodbye to Sue,
And them that are listening it's goodbye to you.

We're a deep water ship with a deep water crew,
You can stick to the coast but we're damned if we do.

We've a jolly good ship and a jolly good crew,
We've a jolly good mate and a good skipper too.

Our ship went a-sailing out over the bar,
We've pointed our bow to the great southern stars.